A Reminder About Civility

We seem to have seen an escalation lately of personal attacks and their intensityÂ on the blog, and of the complaints we’re getting on the side. I’ve had to delete some comments that were clearly over the top, and that’s never a good thing, especially when they have otherwise relevant commentary.

A few commenters also seem to have gotten intoÂ the habit of ad hominem attacks on the press in general or the TU in particular. As I’ve said in the past, I don’t have an issue with thoughtful criticism, but the knee-jerk “media bad” refrain is not simply of no value, it’s destructive.

Sifting through this is also time consuming, since, as some of you know, I try to write a note directly toÂ the posterÂ every time I delete a comment so they know why I did so.

All this takes time away from the news gathering that goes into producing the blog (and the stories we write for print).